SAN JOSE: CAN MARIJUANA COLLECTIVES BE GOOD NEIGHBORS?

Their businesses stand no more than a hundred feet apart, at
opposite ends of a small commercial strip. Neatly dressed, with her
blond hair just so, Sue Campbell has run the Alphabet Soup Preschool
for 29 years. At Purple People Medical, a medical
marijuana dispensary two doors down from the school, Andrew Runner
welcomes patients wearing baggy jeans and spectacular tats.

Recently, as Runner, 28, emerged from the back room of the cannabis
co-op, his eyes were slightly bleary and bloodshot. As Campbell
talked about the arrival of her new neighbor a month ago, her eyes
brimmed with tears. Each is affable, except when talking about the other.

Together, they form a microcosm of an uneasy, often unruly merger of
medicinal marijuana collectives with neighborhoods that don't want them.

"I think it's going to put me out of business, definitely," Campbell
said, dabbing her eyes occasionally as 3-year-olds wove around her
on tricycles. She was named the city's Teacher of the Year in 2006,
but now she isn't sure she will be able to remain open.

She said she had already lost a couple of prospective pupils whose
parents were scared off by the cannabis club. "On one hand, they
honor me," she said of the city. "And on the other, the city is
failing me. This can't be next to a preschool."

Campbell and Runner are both expected to attend a meeting at City
Hall on Monday for so-called stakeholders in this push-me, pull-you
municipal merengue.

City Attorney Rick Doyle and staff from the city manager's office
have not yet drafted an ordinance regulating marijuana collectives
but will offer a rough outline of what issues the future ordinance
will tackle.

"We're trying to craft something with clear rules that will allow
these clubs to exist," Doyle said. "A lot of cities are just saying,
'We don't want 'em,' but that seems like the easy way out. Our
council wants to allow them as long as they comply with state law,
but that's been a tougher nut to crack than we thought."

Councilman Sam Liccardo, who voted with the majority to initiate the
review, would prefer to see marijuana distributed through pharmacies
but sounds resigned to regulation that would cap the number of
collectives and restrict where they could be located. Within a few
feet of a preschool almost certainly wouldn't be allowed in any
ordinance he'd vote for.

Doyle may push for an "urgency ordinance," customarily used to
protect the public's health and safety, at the council's June 22
meeting. Doyle counted aloud the number of cannabis club ads in a
local tabloid, then said, "We need to have a regulation to deal with
the proliferation of these clubs. This is getting out of control."

The city's desire for speed without a substantive ordinance has
frustrated some people. "It feels like we're being railroaded in a
dark room," said James Anthony, consultant for a coalition of San
Jose cannabis collectives called MC3. "If we're going to discuss
it, it would be nice to be able to see it."

Councilman Pierluigi Oliverio drafted a regulatory proposal last
fall, but city government didn't take action until March 30, when
Doyle and City Manager Debra Figone were directed to come up with
something the council could vote on.

"I think in hindsight people wish they had tackled this back in
October," Oliverio said. "Back then, we had maybe two of these
collectives. Now we have 60. Now we're going to have to go through
the legal wrangling of closing quite a few."

It would be fine with Oliverio, Doyle and even the cannabis
coalition if small dispensaries such as Runner's were put out of
business by the proposed ordinance. Security at small dispensaries
is a growing concern following an armed robbery at one last
month, and the city has a preference for large collectives that use
cash registers and accept credit cards - all the better to track
taxes they will owe, Liccardo said.

All of which mystifies Runner, who says he's been dreaming of
opening a marijuana dispensary since he was 18. "My grandmother died
of cancer, and before she passed, I was like, 'Smoke up,' " he
recalled. "So I got into the movement really early. I'm of the
people and for the people."

Runner says his choice of location on De Anza Boulevard wasn't
because it would put him next door to Monsters of Rock, a head shop
that moved next to Alphabet Soup in December and which Campbell
would also like to see disappear. "That's kind of like a plus," Runner said.

He knew there was a preschool there, but didn't expect to find
himself confronted one day by its owners, who accused him of
"selling drugs," he said.

"To tell the truth, I didn't think it would be that big of a deal,"
Runner said. "There are children present, sure, but there's no
smoking or ingesting medication here on the premises, so there's no
effect on the kids." He pointed to a liquor store and a bar nearby.
"I figure there's other businesses that could have worse effects
than mine," he said.

Liccardo would like to see the issue resolved "quickly" so it can be
brought before the council Aug. 3 for a vote, then put on the November ballot.

"If we don't severely restrict where and how medicinal marijuana is
distributed in the city, we're going to see several decades of
effort to preserve the quality of life in our neighborhoods go up in
smoke," Liccardo said. "Literally."

if you're going

A meeting about the proposed medical marijuana ordinance will be
open to the public from 6 to 8 p.m. Monday in the City Council
chamber, 200 E. Santa Clara St., San Jose.